UN week

After a week of early mornings at the UN, you would think I would sleep in today! No such luck. Woke up at 5:30 for a reason unbeknown to me and was out of bed by 8. Maybe its all the built-up excitement of planning my Italy trip today, or maybe I just am programmed from the week... who knows!

We had a very busy past week, spending every day at the UN except for Tuesday. We had seminars with the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR), the WTO, the UN Development Programme (UNDP), the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) - which was not actually in the UN building but still in the same vicinity of Palais Nations, the Office of the Coordinator of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)

...a pretty impressive list, if I may say so myself! All the presentations offered an inside perspective on the operations of each organization, and I found it all quite fascinating. My topic for my independent study project (ISP) on sustainable development in Chile has somewhat evolved into an analysis of Chile's economic reform as a model for development in Latin America. So I spent some time at the UN library on Tuesday, which made me feel official and self-important :P, and again on Friday. I am hoping to go to the the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies library in the near future, which I have been told may have resources more closely related to my topic.

Our french courses concluded on Thursday, which was a little disappointing as I really did enjoy learning the language, but I have already been continuing on my own and with my family, so it's not a total devastation. Our teacher allowed us to have "une fete" during the last part of class, and we played pictionary and a jeopardy-style game in French. Luckily, us beginners landed the best teacher in my opinion, so we had an overall wonderful experience; apparently the advanced students had a horrible one who continuously insulted them in French (we later concluded that she was the same teacher who berated the beginners in our initial placement test for coming to Geneva without knowing French), and they could not wait to be rid of her... we brought ours flowers :)

That same evening, we had a host family reception on the outdoor terrace of the Confiserie Tea-Room in Nyon. It was a very pleasant evening with little hors d'oeuvres set out on tables followed by an assortment of petite desserts. I mingled with the other students and got to meet some of the other families--two of which are in a feud and would not be within close proximity of one another--before retiring to a table with my family and engaging in a very rudimentary conversation in French. It was the most we had spoken so far in French together, and I think they were pleasantly surprised, especially my host mom who does not speak any English.

Then yesterday, after our morning meeting at the UN and my library research, I met with a staff member of South Centre, which is an organization that supports, and whose members are only developing countries to discuss my project. It was a group interview between Mr. Yu of South Centre and three other SIT students, which laid a solid foundation for the organization's activities and involvement in development and influenced my thought process for my particular project. I scheduled a follow-up interview with Mr. Yu that will be individually conducted, so hopefully I can acquire information directly addressed toward my topic.

That pretty much sums up my week! Sophia is coming over soon to lay out our plans for Italy next weekend, and once those are finalized, I will post an update! I am so excited :D

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